On this date in 2015, 2016, 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020, and 2021, “Fanatical Republican Extremist of the Day" profiled the U.S. House Representative from California’s 23rd Congressional District, Kevin McCarthy, who has served for it since 2007, and the man who was supposed to be the heir-apparent to become Speaker of the House after the resignation of John Boehner, until he botched his debut taking the spotlight by boasting about how he had done a great job as one of the Republicans who started the Benghazi hearings which had successfully driven down Hillary Clinton’s poll numbers… which gave away the game the GOP were playing for three years with the topic. It also didn’t help that McCarthy is one of the WORST public speakers in all of Congress (highlights here, courtesy of Rachel Maddow), or that he was also rumored to be having an affair with his colleague, Rep. Renee Ellmers.
Even prior to his catastrophic attempt at becoming House Speaker, Kevin McCarthy has a long, long history of dumbassery within his legislative career, including co-sponsoring legislation in 2007 to stop the “War on Christmas” by passing a bill to recognize the importance of Christmas and Christianity, and signing onto a letter from the Family Research Council pledging that he agrees with them that gay candidates should be barred from public office, and he will never support any of them. That should come as little surprise, as McCarthy and his wife have been interviewed together and have talked openly about how they feel how people “don’t want them to have their right to be a Christian” in America today. Throw in twice voting to defund Planned Parenthood, voting against equal pay for women consistently, and voting against raising the debt ceiling, and you really start to get a big picture of how a box of rocks would get a higher SAT score than Kevin McCarthy.
In the build-up to the 2016 election, McCarthy was trying to appease the lunatics in his party by promising publicly to turn a prospective Hillary Clinton administration into a never-ending line of hearings about faux-scandals, and teasing that they might vote on impeachment. Since the 2016 elections, coming from the most conservative district in California, and has proceeded to continue to shoot his mouth off and embarrass his party, including his admission that he was indifferent about a White Nationalist like Steve Bannon serving as an advisor to the President of the United States, or when audio of him laughing with Congressional colleagues about how he believes both Donald Trump (at the time of the recording, the GOP’s nominee for president), as well as a fellow California Congressman, Dana Rohrabacher, were both being paid by Russian dictator Vladimir Putin.
In May of 2017, McCarthy was egregiously lying and claiming the GOP’s “Trumpcare” plan to replace the ACA wouldn’t cause anyone to lose their Medicaid coverage, in spite of the assessment from the CBO and every medical organization that predicted it would do precisely that. In May of 2018, McCarthy also tried perpetuating the myth that social media platforms were “censoring” the opinions of conservatives, lashing out at Twitter for the fact that he couldn’t read a post from Fox News’ useful idiot Laura Ingraham. This, however, just let House Minority House Leader Nancy Pelosi come along to point out McCarthy was a tech-illiterate boob who didn’t know how to adjust his settings to see the post. And when an octogenarian is more tech savvy than you, you’re hopeless.
Lord only knows what McCarthy will do if he starts echoing the Trump White House’s attacks on Elizabeth Warren for proving her Native American heritage when McCarthy’s own in-laws are in legal trouble for signing up for government loans for Native Americans while claiming 1/8 Cherokee heritage (that they apparently don’t have). Meanwhile, as the 2018 election approached and anti-semitic and racist conspiracy theories were spread by several Republican candidates in a Trumpian effort, who else has followed up a mass shooting at a synagogue and a serial bomber’s attacks by continuing to demonize George Soros with the same ads? Kevin McCarthy.
Kevin McCarthy remains an awful public speaker, and cracks under almost zero pressure in interviews. Further proof would be his interview with CNN’s Dana Bash from August of 2018 when he froze up when asked about how frequently the Trump White House were caught in lies. We got quite an encore in September of 2019 as Kevin McCarthy’s defense of Trump’s actions in trying to force Ukraine to investigate Joe and Hunter Biden and withhold military aid from them when he did was that Scott Pelley “added a word” into the transcript that changed the context and proved Trump’s innocence. (Note: Pelley didn’t add a word, he read what the Trump White House released verbatim, and even with an extra word… it did not make the situation any better.)
After spending the better part a year slandering Robert Mueller and the FBI agents who are investigating the same links to Trump and Russia that Kevin McCarthy was caught on audio establishing as a real thing… William Barr came along to try and end the Mueller Investigation, and almost immediately, Trump started doing new crimes openly with Ukraine. McCarthy is stuck in a perpetual loop of being Trump’s lapdog, because he isn’t smart enough to realize this cycle of Trump being lawless and him having to defend the indefensible will never end.
It’s almost fitting that Kevin McCarthy had to be the one to tell Donald Trump to stop attacking vote-by-mail because Republican’s reliable voters are older, and at-risk, so if in-person voting is supposedly “unsafe” or “unreliable”… the GOP would have its voters afraid of catching Covid-19 and staying home on election day to avoid catching it at the polls. Trump didn’t listen, because of course that moron didn’t, and McCarthy eyeballed the GOP’s chances just before the 2020 election and declared, “We’re screwed.”
He has gone back to Washington to vote against the interests of his constituents while trying to pave a path towards becoming House Speaker:
- December 18th, 2019: McCarthy ignores his Congressional duty to hold a president who has been proven to commit high crimes and misdemeanors accountable and votes against the first impeachment of Donald Trump.
- May 15th, 2020: McCarthy votes against the HEROES Act, to further support the healthcare industry and citizens affected by the Covid-19 pandemic.
- December 10th, 2020: McCarthy signs his name to an amicus brief to the Supreme Court, begging them to overturn the results of the 2020 election. The same election that he won re-election in.
- January 7th, 2021: Kevin McCarthy votes for the objection to the electoral college’s votes in the 2020 election, a failure to send any sort of message that he wasn’t intimidated or sympathetic to those who attacked the Capitol to attempt a violent coup.
- January 13th, 2021: Rep. McCarthy votes against the second impeachment of Donald Trump, because the Republican Party no longer feels like they should be accountable for anything, including failed coups that result in the deaths of both their participants and police officers.
- February 4th, 2021: Kevin McCarthy votes to keep Marjorie Taylor Greene’s committee assignments, because he wouldn’t want her to be accountable for all the bigoted remarks and conspiracy theories she’s spread online (probably because she’s a kindred spirit).
- February 25th, 2021: McCarthy votes against HR 5, the latest version of the Equality Act, that would provide workplace protections for LGBTQ Americans.
- March 3rd, 2021: Rep. McCarthy votes against HR 1, a bill created to prevent the corruption of money in politics, and protect voter access to the ballot box.
- March 3rd, 2021: Kevin McCarthy votes against the George Floyd Justice in Policing Act of 2021.
- March 10th, 2021: McCarthy votes against the American Rescue Plan Act of 2021, because he feels people deserve to die in poverty during a pandemic.
- March 17th, 2021: Rep. McCarthy votes against the re-authorization of the Violence Against Women Act, likely because they feel the 2nd Amendment remaining absolute is more important than preventing people with a history of domestic abuse from owning a firearm (which statistics show, makes them more likely to use those firearms against women in their lives).
- May 19th, 2021: Rep. McCarthy votes against HR 3233, the creation of a commission to investigate the Capitol Attack.
- November 5th, 2021: Kevin McCarthy votes against HR 3684, the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act.
- March 31st, 2022: McCarthy votes against HR 6833, the Affordable Insulin Now Act, which would limit the cost that drug companies could list insulin at to $35 and make sure no diabetic was priced out of surviving their condition. Kevin McCarthy would rather they be gouged by pharmaceutical giants and/or die.
- May 18th, 2022: Kevin McCarthy is one of 192 Republicans who votes against HR 7790, to create supplemental funding for infant formula (while claiming to be pro- life).
- May 18th, 2022: Rep. McCarthy votes against HR 350, the Domestic Violence Prevention Act, because these days, a plank of the Republican Party is ostensibly domestic terror.
- May 19th, 2022: McCarthy votes against HR 7688, a bill which would help prevent gas companies from gouging customers on prices.
- July 15th, 2022: Kevin McCarthy votes against House Amendment 262, which would require the FBI, Department of Homeland Security, and Secretary of Defense to publish a report on the infiltration of American law enforcement by Neo-Nazis and white supremacists, offer measures to be taken to remove them from their ranks, and prevent further infiltration by others.
- July 13th, 2022: McCarthy votes against the Honoring Our PACT Act, to provide healthcare to veterans affected by toxic burn pits while serving in the War on Terror that leave them more susceptible to forms of cancer.
- July 19th, 2022: Rep. McCarthy is one of 157 Republicans who vote against the “Respect for Marriage Act”, which would codify same sex marriage into law nationally.
- July 21st, 2022: McCarthy is one of 195 Republicans who vote against the Right to Contraception Act, which codified the right of Americans to have access to birth control.
- August 12th, 2022: Rep. McCarthy gets ratio’ed on Twitter for asking Americans on Twitter if “are you better off than you were 2 years ago?” People have to remind him that the pandemic was raging out of control with no vaccine, so undoubtedly YES.
- October 19th, 2022: Kevin McCarthy openly talks about denying foreign military aide to Ukraine if Republicans take back the House in 2022, because like many in his party, he’s beholden to Vladimir Putin’s agenda.
Now, we’re not about to forget that during the January 6th attack, Kevin McCarthy was known to have called Donald Trump to ask him to call his dogs off, and was chastised for not doing enough to help the mad king just declare himself ruler for life. We only know because Congresswoman Jamie Herrera-Beutler dropped word about it to the press.
For a few days after the January 6th attack, Kevin McCarthy talked about having an investigation and holding those responsible accountable for what they’d done. Once he had time to regroup with members of his caucus to find out… UH OH, looks like they all helped plan this… well, he backpedaled by a few weeks later to saying “everyone” was responsible for the attack, in the classic domestic abuser’s mentality that their wife made them hit her. He met with Donald Trump at Mar-a-Lago and immediately was brought to heel like the cowering dog he is, failed to hold a raving madwoman like Marjorie Taylor-Greene in any way accountable for the multiple inflammatory and widely untrue comments she makes, but meanwhile held Liz Cheney accountable for trying to defend American democracy against Republicans’ attempts at placing Trump in power in an election he lost by seven million votes and fell in line with the biggest dunces in this party to try to refuse to wear masks in the House, going as far as trying to claim that there’s no science behind wearing them to prevent the spread of disease.
He dug in to do everything he could to sabotage a non-partisan investigation, and lead House Speaker Nancy Pelosi to go ahead with having just a Special Committee investigation. He’s made threats to telecomm companies that they’ll be punished should they comply with the investigation by turning over phone records or in any way, potentially committing obstruction of justice in the process.
The question you might wonder is… why? Why with Donald Trump up a creek without a paddle, and after he literally taunted McCarthy during the attacks, why would McCarthy be stupid enough to try and give him a political lifeline and run interference rather than see him punished for a coup attempt that cost both attackers and law enforcement their lives?
Because, as we’ve established, he’s a craven sack of crap whose only thoughts when his head hits the pillow of night are of how he might get more power. And if he rallied the GOP to rout Trump out of power, they would have potentially paid the price in primaries against the sorts of psychotic white nationalists who love Trump until they are in their own graves. Rather than do what was best for the country, McCarthy decided his lot would be better by sucking back up to Trump in the hopes he’d win his 2022 primary, and maybe the normal swings towards the opposite party losing seats would mean he’d be set up to be the next Speaker of the House. So much so, that he started talking tough about getting the Speaker’s Gavel and beating Nancy Pelosi with it, which, given events of the past week, seems to have resonated with at least one specific psychotic who attempted a stochasic terrorist assassination of Pelosi as a result.
But oh Kevin… you’re such a putz.
The rest of your party aren’t going to ever rally behind you. They’re openly talking about voting Donald Trump to be the next Speaker of the House as part of some stupid scheme where they’d hypothetically impeach both Joe Biden and then Kamala Harris to install him back into the presidency ASAP. As deranged as that plan is… his inability to punish, and excise the lunatics from his caucus means he’s got enough positively deranged fanatics in the House Freedom Caucus/Sedition Caucus chomping at the bit to try it. Even if they don’t, how many back-biting opportunists are there who would attempt to supplant McCarthy? Steve Scalise? Jim Jordan? Marjorie Taylor-Greene? Any number of them are going to throw their hat in the ring, and the process could get easily muddled to leave an unlikable invertebrate like McCarthy dumbstruck and left in the lurch. Even in the hypothetical that the GOP take back control of the House in a week’s time, in January, nothing is certain for him getting the votes.
Let alone if he manages to avoid any criminal charges if he withheld evidence during the Jan. 6th committee or Department of Justice’s investigations in the Capitol Attack…
One Year Ago, November 1st, 2021: Kevin McCarthy (CA)… 2021 Update
Two Years Ago, November 1st, 2020: Kevin McCarthy (CA)… 2020 Update
Three Years Ago, November 1st, 2019: Kevin McCarthy (CA)… 2019 Update
Four Years Ago, November 1st, 2018: Kevin McCarthy (CA)… 2018 Update
Five Year Ago, November 1st, 2017: Kevin McCarthy (CA)… 2017 Update
Six Years Ago, November 1st, 2016: Kevin McCarthy (CA)… 2016 Update
Seven Years Ago, November 1st, 2015: Kevin McCarthy (CA)… Original Profile
Eight Years Ago, November 1st, 2014: Stacey Campfield (TN)